Virtually every retail establishment in the United States displays a sign to indicate whether it is open or closed for business. Most signs are printed with the word "OPEN", and perhaps a message, on one side, and "CLOSED" on the other side. The proprieter simply turns the sign over when opening or closing for the day.
More sophisticated "OPEN-CLOSED" signs are known to the art. U.S. Pat. No. 3,650,055 shows a sign slidable up and down in two channels and rotatable through 180 degrees to reveal the opposite side of the sign. However, space must be provided behind the sign to accommodate the swinging of the sign and its head element during the reversing process. Another "OPEN-CLOSED" sign is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,748,767 where both words are printed on a back panel, and a slidable front panel covers the inappropriate word. Space is required to display both words side by side, so the size of the letters displayed is limited by the width of the surface carrying the sign. Neither of these prior art signs is designed to show the words in letters large enough to be viewed from a distance, such as in a window of a gas station to be viewed from the street.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a compact display of the words "OPEN" and "CLOSED" that does not require space for substantial movement of the sign or covers, whereby the size of the letters may occupy a substantial portion of the space available.
It is a further object of the invention to allow the use of very large letters in relation to the size of the sign to permit easy reading from a distance. For example, letters three inches wide and five inches high by be viewed from a considerable distance. With the present invention, a sign with such large letters may be placed in a 24 inch door window. The size and distance away may be relatively small, as in a fireplace damper indicator, or relatively large, as in a sign for a gas station that can be viewed from the street.